We had this discussion in 2023. And in 2021. 2020, 2019, 2017, 2015, 2013, 2011, 2009, 2008, 2007 and I think 2005. Or so.

Oh dear, poor users don't know where to start. I'm sure that is the one and only thing that stops the entire world from switching to Linux. Certainly not the lack of games, business applications or compelling reasons to switch from the shit that they currently run and know is shit but at least they know that shit.

Linux has won the server OS wars. When's the last time anyone had a serious discussion of using whatever the last windows server OS version is for anything critical? When's the last time you logged into a Solaris machine?

The desktop is a different game, always has been, always will be. It's a game run not by technical excellent. I mean, exhibit A: DOS and Windows, who were never, ever, the best OS - just the most popular one. But on the desktop, what matters is if the users can use it (it's right there in the word) and that hinges on two things: a) familiarity and b) availability of applications.

a) is a lot more serious than most of us nerds realize. Think about any random corporation. Let's say 5000 office employees currently using Windows. Re-training them to use Linux instead might take just a few hours for the tech-savvy ones, and let's say a day for the less so. Add twice that as a period where productivity is at least somewhat hampered by them having to look up again or ask a colleague how to do X. Suddenly you're looking at something like 30-50 thousand hours of lost productivity. And these are not minimum-wage people. So your bill is what, half a million?

b) this is the applications the business actually uses, not some Open Source alternative. If the graphics designers use Photoshop, they need that, not Gimp. Tons and tons of enterprise software is windows-only. And there we are with the chicken-and-egg problem.

Seriously, "the Linux desktop is too fragmented" is bullshit. All things considered, that's the least worry of anyone. And one of the greatest strengths. I know that I would've given up completely on Linux a lot sooner than I actually did if there had only been KDE and Gnome, and not Enlightenment and other interesting options pushing the boundary of the possible. Heck, E would still run circles around almost all UIs today.

What you mean to say is, Airbus doesn't have anything nearly as bad as the 787.

Airbus have the A330 and A350 which competes in the same space as the 787 (which is absolutely abysmal) but are more efficient aircraft. Boeing had to fudge the numbers with the 787 to get the per seat per mile cost down, so it was originally pitched as an 8 abreast economy class but almost every single one is the 9 abreast high density configuration because that's the only way airlines can get close to the promised costs. Most A350s fly in a standard density configuration because the advertised costs of running one can be achieved in standard density.

Why would Airbus need to copy something as terrible as the 787? BTW, an A350 can maintain a lower cabin pressure with the bleed air system than the B787 can with it's electronic one. There's reasons Airbus rejected it, same with the terribad piezoelectric windows which just flood the cabin with blue light when people want to sleep, any weight saving was negligible. Boeing concentrated on shoving more people in, Airbus is concerned with making remotely comfortable (now if we can just get airlines weaned off the Recaro slimline tailbone killers).

Boeing on the other had does not have an answer to the the A320neo or A220 families (not even including the LR and XLR variants). The 737 was a kluge that cost hundreds of lives and the tattered remnants of Boeing's reputation. They needed a clean sheet design rather than just trying to jury rig bigger engines onto an airframe from the 60s... Boeing decided to jury rig bigger engines onto an airframe from the 60s. There will be another major 737 MAX incident because of this.

This. If you don't control the physical security, you don't have any security... If you don't control the physical or data security from the ground up, anyone can get access and you're depending on the good word of whoever runs it... Because Amazon, Microsoft and Google have been so trustworthy in the past.

So efficient they got rid of all the E's.

Erm hate to break it to them... but Saints Row 2 came out 17 years ago where the player-character could be trans... then we have Cyberpunk 2077.

If that's what they're scared of with AI... that ship sailed a long time ago, reached another port and came back with a full cargo of "go fuck yourself".

Now for the sane and stable amongst us, there are two issues with AI.
1. They're taking all the GPU and RAM. Forcing prices up for ordinary gamers.
2. I don't really have any issues with AI generated content per se... what I don't want is a metric ton of AI slop dumped haphazardly into a barely working UE5/Unity engine being sold at Eleventy Billion Europounds because it's got "Call of Snorefare" on the cover... I definitely don't want this to become the norm because it's cheap to produce.

I can see how studios, especially smaller ones can use AI to reduce drudgery, producing minor assets that can be more easily altered to a better quality/creative fit, test a concept before committing to developing it fully, so on and so forth. But I also see some studios, particularly certain large ones producing tonnes of AI slop and flooding the market with substandard games. I mean even more substandard than what they already produce. I'd be surprised if the Apple/Google stores aren't already flooded with crap AI generated games, mobile gaming was a barely contained cesspit before AI.

This is what happens when a government becomes beholden to businesses.

California at least still has to give the impression that they care about or represent the people. Had this happened in a state that isn't as powerful as California or more corrupt, like say, Kentucky, the courts would have already rules that the autonomous cars and their owners are completely free of any liability, in fact they'll issue you a ticket for getting run over by one.

trump has been president less than a year

Abandon hope, all ye who press enter here.

Now, yes, there are predictions that you could get a supermassive black hole launched into space, especially during a galaxy merger if the velocity of the smaller black hole exceeds the escape velocity of the combined galaxy.

But I'd be wary of assuming that it's a launched black hole, unless we can find the merger it comes from. There may be ways for such a black hole to form that cause the stars to be launched away rather than the black hole being flung, and if a galaxy isn't rotating fast enough to be stable, one could imagine that a sufficiently small galaxy was simply consumed by its central black hole. Both of these would seem to produce exactly the same outcome, if all we have is the black hole itself and a velocity.

I'm not going to say either of these is likely in this case, or that astronomers haven't examine them (they almost certainly have), but rather that we should be cautious until we've a clearer idea of what the astronomers have actually been able to determine or rule out.

>>Even one of the Balkan countries managed to take down a corrupt government two weeks ago with largely uncoordinated public protests.

after how many years of just dealing with the problem?

It's not that much of a change, though. The USA has only ever paid lip-service to its "allies" and always seen Europe as competitors. It's not a shift from "friend" to "enemy", just from "competitor" to "enemy".

No, the executive tells the civil service what it needs to do, but the civil service is wholly independent.

Aviation is so incredibly safe because of the attitude that "1 in 1 million" happens far too often to be left to chance.

That being said, aviation is a "just culture" so given that this failure meant that no-one was actually harmed and all that happened was a 12 year old kid flew to Rome (and back to London again) without a ticket. So they'll analyse what went wrong and then make a procedure to prevent it from happening again. No one will even get fired (doubly so as it takes so long for someone to get security clearance to work at an airport in the UK). However everyone will know it's Frank's fault they're having to sit through another safety procedure briefing, Frank will be living this down for a while.

Erm.. the guy is a kid of 12 or 13... he didn't socially engineer or study anything. He tailgated someone through the two areas where you check your boarding pass (an automated gate before security where you scan your boarding pass and at the gate itself which is the first place they actually check your ID and boarding pass).

This happened because normal people are too polite and kind to interrogate every kid who passes through.

From your utter butchering of the Kings English, you're clearly an American. Jokes aside, you should travel outside the US and find out that airports outside the US are not as bad as they are inside the US. Hence you get all the way to the gate before someone checks both your boarding pass and ID... and the ID is often optional when taking a domestic or intra-EU flight.

The airline is ultimately responsible for letting him on. Border Force (security) are responsible for safety (dangerous and illegal items), the airport is responsible for non-security equipment working (belts, gates, et al.) but it's the airline who decides who gets onto a plane or not.

I see you've never travelled outside the US... it's better almost everywhere else.

The fact this happened means that it's better in the UK. As a frequent traveller out of LHR (London Heathrow international airport) I can see exactly how this happened and also understand it's not common.

First of all, you're conflating the responsibility of the various parties involved. Border Force is not tasked with ensuring the passenger is ticketed, their job is handling the security infrastructure and ensuring passengers don't have any dangerous goods or illegal items. The airlines are ultimately responsible for letting people on the plane, so they're the ones to blame here, not security or the airport.

Allow me to explain how it typically goes down when flying from Heathrow.

1. Arrive for my international flight 2 hours ahead of the scheduled take off time.
2. Check in to the automated check-in machines (if you have not already checked in online) and tag my bag.
3. Drop my bag off at the allotted desk.
4. Head to security.
4.1. Join the queue to enter the autmated gates, its never a long queue. Scan my boarding pass and the gates open.
4.2. Listen to the friendly Heathrow queue fuhrer who'll direct you to the shortest security line (seriously, they do a fantastic job of balancing the lines so no-one gets stuck in a 50 mile long queue, unlike say on the M25 just outside Heathrow).
4.3. Listen to the friendly Border Force crier who tells you what you need to take out, take off or keep in your bag (electronics and liquids can stay now, the LAG restrictions are also gone from most UK airports).
4.4. Join the queue for the rapey-scanner. It's never more than 2 or 3 people.
4.5. Enter the rapey-scanner when directed, put your arms above your head and legs akimbo like you're about to start strutting your funky stuff.
4.6. Collect your bag off the X-ray scanner after flighting your way past the belt lice who's bags went in after yours.
5. Get airside and realise that the entirety of the above took less than 30 mins and wonder what the fuck you're going to do with yourself for the next hour (but you know if you arrived with just 1 hour to go something would have gone wrong, it's sods law of airports).
6. After wasting time and paying a kings ransom for a drink in WH Smith's head to your gate and join a queue of complete fucktards who can't follow a simple instruction like "boarding group 3 only, if you're not in boarding group 3 please remain seated" who are also trying to carry on 6 tonnes of luggage.
7. BA have finally started turning away people who are not in the correct boarding group so when you eventually get to the front of the line, this is the first person who actually checks both your boarding pass and ID to ensure that you are the passenger you say you are.
8. Fight for the overhead bin space as every fucktard brings more luggage than they are permitted.
9. When the doors are finally shut, prepare for the 20-30 min wait on the Heathrow taxiway because some wombles have been blocking the construction of the third runway for 30 years because they're cockwombles
10. Sit back, relax and shut up. It's a long way to Canada.

Most countries have dispensed with most of the US instantiated security theatre. Hell, the worst part of airports outside the US (and even mostly inside the US) are dealing with other passengers. Automation has made the process of going through an airport even easier than it was in the 90s before the US lost it's shit and decided everyone else had to as well.

Now it's easy to understand how this occurred because the "man" in question was actually a boy of 12 of 13 depending on which article you believe and they know how he did it... He tailgated someone else through the automated gates and boarding process. Border Force had nothing to do with it and the Heathrow staff will just end up with another safety briefing as it wasn't reasonable or prudent for them to stop and interrogate a kid. As mentioned above, it's the gate agents who work for the airlines who will bear responsibility and even then, aviation works on a principle of "just culture" which encourages people to be honest about mistakes rather than blaming them making them so they won't have anything lumped on them apart from perhaps a new procedure.